Category Archives: Italy

Friday was a different days for Steve and I as Steve was off to Venice to meet his wife who is flying over to meet him (my wife will be over shortly) and I was off to Croatia to spend some time with the “in-laws”, more specifically the Mother in Law. In total the ride through to Nasice, Croatia was approx 875km meaning I arrived well after mid night.

We rode through to the outskirts of Venice together and it was (this is getting boring) another great day of riding! The Euro roads and mountain passes taking road riding to another level.

Even muscling our 290kg rides through mountain passes was fantastic and the capability of the BMW’s to cover ground at a very good pace is a credit to their design. It is when you pull up and try to manoeuvre them that the fun begins!

Steve and I will be catching up on the 1st July to continue our Mad Ride and in the mean time Steve will have quality time with the wife and I shall be earning “browny points” with the mother in law.

Como to Trento, with some of the best riding we have had to date. Mountain passes, snow capped mountain ranges, quaint and beautiful villages somehow hanging on the side of the steep terrain. the highest peak we crossed was approx 2,000metres.

We have camped at a working orchard that is flanked by high mountains either side. We are certainly getting into the European way as having dinner at the local restaurants along the way certainly form a major social high for the day, and the food is always well tasty!

The day went well overall with no navigation issues and the only downside was a slug found in the luggage!

We got off to another reasonable start (before 09:00hrs) today and headed to Como. While stopping off at a town called Bra (yes, that is the correct name), David managed to become distracted and left the Spot Tracking device sitting at a petrol station! Only trouble was we did not realise until we were 65km away in Asti!

so a brisk ride back to Bra and the petrol attendant had the tracker thankfully. Major fail on David’s part!

after the “cock up” we headed through to Como and hit camp around 6:30pm. Unfortunately the camp site last night was rubbish to say the least!

We headed into town and had the most wonderful view of the rip while sitting eating a pizza alongside Lake Como. If you visit Italy, take time to Visit Como!

This is a home made bottle of chilli in oil. Check the label!They make their pillons big in Italy!

The ride today was from Menton, France to Cuneo, Italy. We got off to a reasonably early start 08:50hrs after packing up camp.

On the way we passed through Monaco managing to ride most of the track.

We met a captain of one of those motor launches (34m) and he explained a few facts about owner inc a vessel like those you see by the dozen along the riviera. So a typical vessel of this size will cost between 10 ~ 15m€, parking costs approx 1,000€ (plus a bag of cash) per day in Monaco and 8,000€ at Capri. Fuel usage is 600litres per hour and up to 10,000 with diesel costing a 1€ per litre. So there you go, if you are thinking of buying a boat for your summer you have a rough idea of the costs!

Cuneo is a lovely regional town and we had the best camp site yet with excellent facilities which made a big difference.

In making our way to Cuneo we actual crossed over the boarder between France and Italy 3 times weaving through the mountain passes.